Is just a choice

To make a mountain of your life
Is just a choice
But I never learned enough
To listen to the voice that told me
Always love, hate will get you every time

Always love, don’t wait til the finish line
Slow demands come ’round
Squeeze the air and keep the rest out
It helps to write it down
Even when you then cross it out

But always love, hate will get you every time
Always love even when you wanna fight

Self-directed lives
I want to know what it’d be like to
Aim so high above
Any card that you get dealt you….

~ Always Love – Nada Surf

When’s the future?

Routine is boring.

It becomes so mundane and dreary, you start to wonder, is this all there is to life?

Not many can afford the Yes-Man method of doing things. Not everyone has the money. Let’s face it, even if people say money isn’t everything, how many really believe that? Maybe if we live in an earlier era, where having your own farm, growing your own food and living with a tight community is a part of life.

Now individualism is important. Freedom of expression. Following the mainstream flow is rubbish. Along the way, we lose what it’s like to live without the non-essentials we live with now.

Maybe solitude can be a good thing. Reevaluate my values and principals. Away from it all. To do something that matters, that changes the world. Not stuck in the daily grind, banking on it for a better future.

Because by the time its “future”, it might be too late.

Hear the cold silence?

We always try to see past the mistakes our friends make. Being a friend entitles one to be ignorant of certain transgressions that has been committed. Even if it means being a miserable bitch. A storm begins, cold wars erupt, ties become muted.

Then one day, things return to normal again. No forgiveness, no apologies. Just a hastily buried hatchet within sight, easy to unearth at any time. When things come to a head one day, and the cold wars erupt into all-out battle, all hatchets will be unearthed, and people will get hurt.

I’ve seen how this volatile thing called friendship, even after ten years and many ties that bind, can easily crumble to dust at the most trivial thing. We try to look past mistakes as a good friend, and offer advice. We look away when things get ugly, bitching behind the walls. Then somehow expect the silence that lay can be lifted by the dawn of a new day, forgotten among the piles of repressed emotions and pretentious facade.

I guess we value our friendship too much to risk destroying it by telling the truth. We fear that a confrontation will destroy the very foundation our friendship is based on, considering that truth is a matter of perspective. Hopefully telling ourselves that one day things will be better, and it’s nothing to fuss about. A snowflake is as light as air, but when it comes tumbling down in an avalanche, it could snuff the life out of you.

I hear it, feel it, seen it happen, time and again. The small, trivial problems that are harmless on their own, but collectively being the equivalent of a mental time bomb.

One side might be so clueless to what’s happening. And telling that one side as a third party will just backfire as the spittle fly back and forth.

So I refuse to really believe what one side is saying until I hear the other side, for one perceives the world as heaven and the other hell.

So it’s a matter of personal judgement to see how much we can take, or should take, before we break all bonds.

Because a true friend will not want to see you suffer.

Know your nicoise

Always be prepared. And so far two interviews later, I still suck at them, and always, always go in unprepared when it comes to food knowledge.

Interviewer: So what kinds of salads do you know how to make?

Me: Caesar salad.

I: Ok. So what’s inside?

M: Lettuce, tomatoes, hard boiled eggs.. uhm..

I: Uh huh. Ok.

M: Anchovies, black olives.. *panicking*

I: That’s not Caesar.

M: Huh?

I: That’s nicoise.

KANTOI!!!!!!!

 

Tried and tired

Trainees are frustrating. The one I have right now la anyway.

Patience is indeed golden. I now know I am not very adept at teaching. Two weeks is still too early to tell, but she is going nowhere. A bit of improvement but the most important thing isn’t even there to begin with.

INTEREST. PASSION.

Me: Are you really interested in pastry?

Her: Yes. That’s why I took the course. But as long as it’s not too dirty.

Me: *watfak???!* What do you mean? It’s the kitchen! It’ll always be messy and dirty.

This coming from the girl who almost cried when I asked her to fold the sponge mixture because she has to dip her entire arm (which is covered in hygienic covering and gloves) into the mixing bowl.

Christmas holidays coming up. Christmas holidays coming up. That’s all I keep on chanting.

Xp

Not just an asshole

Some people are assholes. Some people are just misunderstood people who look like assholes.

Take the bus driver of a certain U81 bus that often drives me home. He’s an asshole. He certainly looks like one. He enjoys arguing with passenger, patronizing over their destinations, repeating his statements over and over again just to drive his point home and raising his voice like he owns the bus.

But sometimes, you can catch him with a smile on his face, as he greets the passengers boarding the bus. Maybe he isn’t such a bitter man after all. Maybe years of toiling night and day driving down endless roads from Pasar Seni to Kampung Subang took a toll on his sanity. Maybe handling all the human nonsense is bearable, the ignorance of new rules and etiquette, but after it hit the thousand mark, he soon loses that last thread of patience. Who among us can say, that even on our bests days, are patient enough to handle the inanities and quirks of the milling throng with a sincere smile on our faces that won’t get tired, and a willing heart to show concern?

He is flawed. We’re all flawed, but we try to make it through the day. And some of us try to understand that despite all the tantrums a child may throw, or a fit by an old lady, there’s a reason because inherently we all started with a blank slate, but the cruelties of the world is never ending.

Enough so that the slate might be broken before the bearer’s life end.

A good day

I got back my wallet.

Amazing and totally unexpected. Except for the part where my money is gone, which is expected. But at least i don’t have to fork out 100 bucks for a new I.C.

So great thanks to Deena of MINDEF.

I swear I’ll return any lost things I find.

A trainee named Santai

Me: You look after the oven. So when the timer rings, you take it out OK?

Codename Santai: ok (practically a whisper) *nods head*

Ring!!!

Me: *looks up*

Ring!!!

Me: *walks over to Santai, looks at her*

Ring!!

Santai: *looks back*

Me: The timer rang already. You can take it out now.

Ring!!!

Santai: *nods head* Walks slowly to the sink at the far end of the kitchen, wash hands and saunters back to the oven*

Me: T.T

Why Santai? Macam bersantai di tepi pantai. Rileks je.

Before that it was Codename: Letih

I did say it was only their first week, but the other guy is way faster than she is, who responds with a nod and a sheepish smile. Hard to get pissed because she looks like she’ll get a nervous breakdown if you raise your voice one iota above normal. And the other guy over baked like 15 trays of gingerbread man, but he didn’t cry, yet.

I really hope speed will be her forte. Optimism!!

 

 

What happened

It was almost a year ago when I lost my wallet somewhere in the Sepang racing circuit.

Almost a year later, the same thing happened, only it was in the LRT.

It’s not just the money (didn’t lose too much), but the hassle of redoing the I.C, ATM cards, plus the fine for I.C lost, which would be my second time. I must be really unlucky. Not to mention the police report.

And I lost my monthly pass for both LRT and bus. And the last 50 bucks I had on me till payday.

The police asked me what I lost so I mention the typical docs. I.C, three ATM cards etc. I wondered whether to mention about the card where if I purchase a certain amount of DVDs I get the next one free. But the disputable legality of the vendor and his wares… well, better I shut up.

Must get I.C done first, then can do ATM cards, unless I redo my cards in the branches where I opened my accounts which is the only means for me to withdraw money on my payday to pay for my I.Cs and ATM cards which I cannot do because I don’t have a card and because I finish later than bank counter services.

T.T

The next time I get pissed over my pack of cigarettes going missing, I’m gonna think of this.

TQVM.

The Gathering Storm

Call me a geek, I don’t mind. I thrive in fantasy novels. Partly played by my overactive imagination, even if I’m not so vocal about it.

This is the PERFECT Christmas gift.

For those who’re actually interested in why I want this book so much…

Robert Jordan, whom I think is the best writer in the fantasy genre alongside Tolkien, published the first volume of The Wheel of Time in 1990, which expanded into 11 volumes across the length of almost 2 decades (painstakingly long wait, I know).

Then he died. Crap.

He never finished the series as he was writing the final volume when he was diagnosed with cancer and passed away. Preparing for his impending demise, he left numerous notes in the hopes that there would be a writer who’ll end the series. And they found him. The twelfth book was to be the final volume, and he was adamant about it. But Brandon Sanderson (the heir), couldn’t end and tie up all the lose plots in one volume. So he and Robert’s wife decided on 3 books, essentially one book divided to three, because you can’t bind 750k words worth of pages into one book.

All three will be published one year apart, with this volume which came out October this year, so obviously it hasn’t arrived in Malaysia yet.

And you can imagine the agony of waiting to see how the whole story ends. And I’ll be 22 by then. Think of those poor sods who’s been following it since 1990!

That’s why it’s the PERFECT gift. Since the final two volumes will be tentatively released November 10′ and 11′, it’s in time for Christmas every year.

But among all, I’m the lone literature buff. So I’ll just buy it myself.